Squirrel Wind

7/26/2006

Smoking a cigarette with the constant tickle of flies on my ankles and shins,
the sun sets in the West behind pine and sun-burnt grasses,
a thin layer of butter light spreads through the boughs.
The dogs run down a red squirrel at full speed, and with casual frustration it dances up the tree, tail twitching, its voice tauntingly fills the empty air,
the striped tail whipping in accompaniment to the crescendos of inflection.
As I type this, cigarette still burning as the smoke stings my eyes,
our red tailed friend has embarked on a chirping frenzy, that of which
one might expect of a finch on acid. And as I finish this line, he is still;
or maybe she. I don’t know its sex. And at this moment,
it is if its renewed chirping is incensed that I do not know its sex.
No. Still chirping. Almost, there…no. Not quite. It’s screeches and breaches
of silence have my attention. “Hey!” I yell.
“Who are you yelling at?” my lover asks me, looking around wonderingly from her book.
“The squirrel,” I reply. Chirp, chirpity bark barkity sqirtitly chirp.
“He’s Crazy Squirrel,” she toys. “Kingsford! Go get ‘em!” she orders the black pug who started the whole thing, and he dolls his eyes from droopy lids and graying brow.
In reply to this, and to my statement that he (or she) is marking “his” territory,
the chirping resides, the dogs still lie still, and
K. T. Tunstell hums along to the stride of acoustic guitar and the soft, gentler chirps of the birds, the whirring of mourning dove wings and neighing of horse far across the field, underneath it all, the slow long flowing hum of eighteen wheelers and their loads cruising along on rubber and concrete, the axels driving turn after turn towards their delivery. And the horse neighs, and far out in the field the horse neighs while the dogs lay chill and sequestered.